General
The so-called patellar tip syndrome is a disease of the bone-tendon transition at the patella caused by overloading. It is usually a very painful, degenerative disease. The overloading is often caused by certain sports, which are accompanied by pressure and tensile stress on the patella.
The fact that the disease is also associated with a lot of jumping can be deduced from the English term “jumper’s knee”. The treatment of patellar tendinitis is initially mostly conservative. Only if conservative therapy does not cure the disease, surgery is usually considered.
There are different surgical methods that can be used depending on individual factors. The prognosis of the disease as well as the healing after patellar tendon syndrome surgery can be considered very good. Thus, most of those affected achieve freedom from symptoms after the operation and a long post-operative treatment.
Symptoms
The patellar tip syndrome is accompanied by characteristic symptoms. However, not all symptoms are necessarily present. The extent and occurrence of the symptoms is determined by the individual disease and can vary from person to person. A typical symptom of patellar tendon syndrome is knee pain, which usually occurs in relation to stress. In contrast to other knee complaints, the pain caused by patellar tendon syndrome usually occurs after the load phase and partially disappears completely during the warm-up and load phase.
Cause
The cause for the occurrence of the patellar tendon syndrome is an overload of the structures at the bone-tendon transition of the patella and the tendons running there. The overload usually occurs due to certain sports activities that are associated with a high tensile stress on the patella and the tendons. Thus, the disease often occurs during so-called jumping sports such as volleyball, basketball, or athletics. In addition to the type and frequency of the sport performed, individual factors such as age or congenital disorders of the muscle-ligament apparatus influence the occurrence of the disease.
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